REACHED FOR COMMENT BY THESE REPORTERS, OPRAH DECLARED SHE WAS VERY BUSY THESE DAYS ATTEMPTING TO BRING OUT A LINE OF DOUBLE SIDED DILDOS BUT, YES, SHE WAS SUPPORTING BARRY O AND CHIEFLY BECAUSE HIS "TITS SAG MORE THAN MINE AND THAT AIN'T EASY."

IN THE BACKGROUND, THESE REPORTERS HEARD GAYLE KING HOLLER BACK, "IT AIN'T EASY! YOU GOT THAT RIGHT, MR. WINFREY!"

The Iraq War and the Afghanistan War have produced many veterans. Many services are needed, many resources are overtaxed.

In San Diego a vacant building could house close to fifty veterans. KGTV's 10 News reports, "Dr. Robert Smith presented the plan which he said is particularly necessary in the San Diego area as it has the largest population of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans in the nation at 28,000." But the psychiatric facility found objection at the Mission Hillas Town Council hearing by some parents who say that a school across the street from the vacant building means children could be at risk. Jeanette Steele (San Diego Union-Tribune) adds "neighbors are wary, saying it's not a 'vets versus kids' equation. They ay it's a great facility but there must be better places to put it in sprawling San Diego." If they're worried about danger to the kids, a vacant building in a city, as a general rule, tends to attract more problems than an occupied building. That's drug use and drug dealing, that's a safety hazard for children (who naturally enjoy exploring and may enter a vacant building) and so much more. The facility would be a medical one. There's no guarantee that it would be any more safe than any other medical facility, or any less safe. There are many reasons to oppose a new facility -- veterans or otherwise -- coming into a neighborhood but one that would fill a building that now stands empty? Ex-Navy nurse Mary Rushton is quoted stating, "When these veterans fail the program and are asked to leave, that's the end of the VA's responsibility. Who knows what could happen? From not controlling their emotions and reactions, things along those lines. I don't think these kids need to see anything." And what's really sad is that's from a former Navy nurse. The government sent people to war, there's no need to hdie that reality from children. Are they at risk? By the nurse's argument everyon across the country is at risk. I believe schools are supposted to have their own safety procedures. Does she not trust the school? We know she doesn't trust the veteran. In the comments, Tikvah Organics' owner Cyndi Norwitz makes this point:

Unbelievable. There are children in every neighborhood, so are these people in opposition saying these vets aren't welcome anywhere? There are schools in most neighborhoods too. As for being across the street from a school, that seems ideal to me. When school is in session (plus the hours before and after), the place is swarming with staff. What could be safer than that? My daughter's in first grade and I would have no problem with a center like this being across the street from her school

Hugh Lessig (Virginia's Daily Press) reports on Hampton Veterans Administration Medical Center's program which issues housing vouchers to veterans in need: "The bad news? Business is bomming here in Hampton Roads" and the veteran population they served used to trend to 40 to 60 years old but is now starting to decrease in age to their 20s and 30s. Meanwhile in Illinois, homeless veterans continue to increase in numbers. Susan Frick Carlman (Naperville Sun) reports the Midwest Shelter for Homeless Veterans needs to open a second home and raised the issue at a town hall. US Senator Dick Durbin offered a non-reassuring, "I've got to look for new ways to help you, and if I can, I'll find some. If you've got the dedicated volunteers and professionals to make it work, it's a heck of an investment." If San Diego is the norm 9i hope it's not), then, should money be found, the shelter would next face the issue of finding a location that didn't have all the neighbors clutching the pearls.

Finding the money should be easy, after all the government's worked so very hard to refuse to give veterans the proper disability rating to save money (and cheat veterans). But sometimes veterans win in spite of it all. Michael Doyle (McClatchy Newspapers) reports, "After three years of legal maneuvering, a federal judge in late December quietly approved the settlement that covers [Iraq War veteran Chris] Crotte and about 2,100 other veterans who've been medically discharged since 2002 with post-traumatic stress disorder. Under the settlement, one of several similar efforts now under way, affected veterans discharged with PTSD will get better benefits, including lifetime health care and post-exchange privileges. The affected veterans had been discharged with disability ratings that were way too low to receive such benefits." On the subject of PTSD, the University of California San Francisco's Steve Tokar reports of a new study on women veterans and PTSD:

Women who served in the U.S. Army in Iraq and Afghanistan were involved in combat at significantly higher rates than in previous conflicts, and screened positive for post-traumatic stress disorder at the same rate as men, according to a study led by researchers at the San Francisco VA Medical Center and the University of California, San Francisco.

"While women technically are not supposed to serve in direct combat, this research demonstrates that, in reality, they are experiencing combat at a higher rate than we had assumed," said lead author Shira Maguen, PhD, a clinical psychologist at SFVAMC and an assistant clinical professor of psychiatry at UCSF. "At the same time, it shows that men and women really don't differ in how they react to the stresses of combat."

Women in the U.S. military gradually have been integrated into combat roles since the early 1990s, and today comprise about 14 percent of Americans serving in uniform. Of roughly 2.2 million troops who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan, more than 255,000 have been women, according to the Pentagon. Under current U.S Army rules, women are not officially assigned to units whose primary mission is direct combat on the ground, but can be assigned to other roles in combat zones.

The study of 7,251 active-duty soldiers who served in Iraq and Afghanistan is the first study, the authors say, to include gender as a variable in examining responses to four combat-associated traumatic experiences: killing, witnessing someone being killed, exposure to death (seeing dead soldiers or civilians) and injury.

These same women have found themselves, concurrently, caught in a second, more damaging war - a private, preemptive one in the barracks. As one female soldier put it, "They basically assume that because you are a girl in the Army, you're obligated to have sex with them." Resisting sexual assault in the barracks spills over to the battlefield, according to many women veterans, in the form of relentless verbal sexual harassment, punitive high-risk assignments and the morbid sense that your back is not being watched.The double trauma of war and sexual assault by "brothers-in-arms" within a culture of impunity for perpetrators may explain why a 2008 RAND Corporation study [1] "found that female veterans are suffering double the rates of depression and post-traumatic stress disorder [PTSD] than their male counterparts." Patricia Resick, a psychiatrist who researches PTSD in women for the Veterans Administration (VA), asserts "sexual trauma is a more significant risk factor for PTSD than combat or the types of trauma that men generally experience." Resick adds that sexual trauma, unlike combat trauma, is caused by people who are supposed to bond with you and protect you, and that betrayal by those you need to trust with your life deepens the harm.Military sexual trauma (sometimes referred to as MST) is so extreme that it is even more likely to cause PTSD in women than civilian sexual trauma ­­- because of military culture.

Many veterans and contractors also suffering from exposure to burn pits. For some the exposure has cost their lives. Next next month, the first ever scientific symposium will be held in New York.

The school of Medicine, State University of New York at Stony Brook, is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education to provide continuing medical education for physicians.

The School of Medicine, State University of New York at Stony Brooke designates this live activity for a maximum of 6 AMA PRA Category 1 Credit(s)TM. Physicians should only claim the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.

The War Party's lynch mob was out for Thorsen's hide the very next day, withDemocratic party shill Paul Rieckhoff, head of Iraq and Afghanistan Veteransof America, declaring:"Our troops are many things to many people. Heroes, parents, diplomats,victims, villains, victors. But as the GOP Primary races roll through NewHampshire this week, there is one thing that all of America must understandthey're not: political props.And that's not just my opinion, it's the law."This is why so many of us in the military and veterans community wereso shocked and outraged last Tuesday night when we saw Corporal JesseThorsen step up to the microphone in uniform and endorse Ron Paul for President. We know the law -- the military lawunder the UCMJ (Uniform Code of Military Justice). We know Article 88of UCMJ prohibits contemptuous speech by commissioned officers againstthe President and certain elected officials at penalty of court-martial."Rieckhoff is off his rocker: the section of the complicated and oftencontradictory regulations being invoked against Thorsen has nothing to dowith "contemptuous speech," but with engaging in partisan political activitywhile in uniform. Here is what Thorsen had to say at the Paul rally: do youhear any "contemptuous speech" in these remarks? I thought not. However,if you're a Democratic party operative like Rieckhoff -- who has served asan official party spokesman – you do indeed hear "contemptuous speech" inThorsen's condemnation of President Obama's foreign policy. CNN did aninterview with Thorsen earlier, but cut him off when he started to talk abouthow our interventionist foreign policy is opposed by most soldiers -- which iswhy Paul has garnered more donations from military personnel than all othercandidates combined.